Israel in 'all-out war' with Hamas

Israel's military is in an "all-out war" with Hamas in the Gaza Strip, Ehud Barak, the defence minister, says.

More than 300 Palestinians have been killed in three consecutive days of aerial bombardment in the heavily-populated territory.

"We have nothing against Gaza residents, but we are engaged in an all-out war against Hamas and its proxies," Barak said on Monday.

There were also growing fears that a ground offensive was being planned after a "closed military zone" was declared around the Gaza Strip.

The announcement created a buffer zone along the border which Israeli officials say will help protect it from rocket attacks.

Civilians, including journalists, could be banned from an area between 2km and 4km deep under the policy. On previous occasions, such a move has sometimes been followed by military operations.

"This operation will expand and deepen as much as needed," Barak said. "We went to war to deal a heavy blow to Hamas, to change the situation in the south."

Military build-up

Tanks and troops have been massed in the area since Operation Cast Lead was launched on Saturday.

Al Jazeera's Ayman Mohyeldin, reporting from Gaza City, said that there was little the residents of Gaza could do to prepare for any possible ground assault.

"In a city that is so densely-populated a ground offensive would mean urban warfare, street-to-street fighting ... leaving many Palestinians in the cross-fire," he said.

"Unlike other conflict zones where there is the possibility to flee the war zone, Gaza itself has become the war zone. There is nowhere for the population to go, they are in the middle of all these attacks."

Israel said it began pounding the Gaza Strip with missiles fired from warplanes and helicopter gunships in order to halt the rocket and mortar attacks by Palestinian fighters.

"Military officials said yesterday that this operation will go on until Hamas stops firing missiles into southern Israel,"Al Jazeera's Hoda Abdel Hamid, reporting from southern Israel, said.

"They are also very much aware that they wouldn't really be able to stop that, but at least they will try to degrade the capability of Hamas."

Scores of rockets have hit southern Israel since the offensive got under way.

On Monday, an Israeli Arab was killed and eight others wounded when one of the missiles hit a construction site in the city of Ashkelon.

"Israel is being attacked from Gaza and that has been the situation for the last eight years, and we did everything we could to avoid escalation," Tzipi Livni, the foreign minister and governing Kadima party leader, told parliament.

"We need to fight those who are trying to prevent us from living in peace."

Civilian casualties

The UN relief and works agency said on Monday that at least 51 Palestinian civilians, including women and children, were confirmed to be among among those killed in the Gaza Strip.

Four young girls from the same family in the northern town of Jabaliya and two young boy from Rafah were among those killed in the latest raids, Palestinian medics said.

Al Jazeera's Sherine Tadros said the situation at the Shifa hospital in Gaza City was chaotic as the territory's health system struggled to cope with the more than 1,400 people injured.

"Hundreds of people are just waiting outside ... a lot of those people, the problems is that there simply arent enough beds to cope with the number of injured,' she said.

"Medical sources here are telling us they are running out of everything, from gauzes to saline solutions, and critically now they are running out of almost every type of blood."

A six-month truce between Israel and Hamas in the Gaza Strip ended on December 19.